Friday, July 12, 2013

Immediate Reaction to Philipp Meyer's The Son

Despite being well into my seventh year here at Book Chase, I believe this is the first time that a book has moved me to write something about it almost as soon as I turned its final page. That book is the new novel (only his second) by Philipp Meyer called The Son.I will, of course, be writing a formal review of The Son in a few days but I don't want to wait that long to help get out the word about this one. I won't pretend that it is for everyone, because I can't imagine that any book is, but for those who enjoy multi-generational family sagas, I can confidently predict that you will love The Son. Meyer tells the story of seven generations of a Texas family, beginning in 1836 and ending in the present day, but he concentrates on only three main characters and lets them tell their individual stories in alternating chapters. Male readers will probably be most taken by Eli McCullough, born in 1836, who calls himself "the first male child of the Republic of Texas." Female readers might be more drawn to Jeanne Anne, born three generations later in 1926, who despite her sex kept the family fortune together until her death.I will be very pleasantly surprised if The Son does not top my 2013 Fiction Top Ten list at the end of the year - because that means I will have discovered another great book. It will take something very special to move The Son from my top slot.

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